The Missourians were a mid-western band that was greatly influenced by Benny Moten. In the mid-1920s they relocated to New York and played at the Cotton Club under the name of Andy Preer and the Cotton Club Orchestra and as the Cotton Club Orchestra. After Preer's death in 1927, Duke Ellington got the gig. The Missourians are best remembered today for their association with Cab Calloway, who first worked with them in New York, in 1928. In 1930, he took over the band, eventually changing its name to Cab Calloway and his Orchestra and they once again found themselves as the house band at the Cotton Club. R.Q. Dickerson plays some wonderful plunger-mute trumpet on Prohibition Blues.